November 8, 2015

To the Head and Heart of Istanbul

After you have seen all of Istanbul,
there is still more to see. To make sense of that seemingly contradictory proposition,
I had left GalataTower
and Taksim Square for the
last on my itinerary. After three consecutive years of visits that had covered
miles of wandering in the streets of the city, I wanted to see more. What
better way than rounding off the series with a bird’s eye view that captures
much of history and geography, and then to feel the pulse of a city that beckons
you to visit yet one more time.

Fatih, Yusuf and Tugrul, three eager young TurkishAirForceAcademy
cadets, part of a group detailed to look after the visiting delegates, joined
me for a weekend jaunt to see the city’s remarkable history come alive in an
incredible panorama.After waiting in
line for the steeply-priced tickets at the base of GalataTower for about twenty minutes, we
decided to forego the lift and use the spiral stairway, huffing and puffing our
way 150 feet up to the observation deck. The sooner we reached the café on the
uppermost floor, we were utterly surprised by a little five-year old girl who
was following us up the stairs. She was beaming delightfully for having
accomplished what the hardened military men plodding ahead of her had done with
so much effort.

Galata is a former Genoese quarter of old Istanbul
(Constantinople) across the Golden Horn
waterway. This neighbourhood was actually a walled Genoese enclave within Constantinople,
having been ‘granted’ to the powerful Republic
of Genoa by the Byzantine Emperor
in 1267. The enclave was fortified by a now
non-existent citadel, and the landmark ChristTower (as it was then known), was
built in 1348 to reflect the influence of the Genoese in the Byzantine capital.

In the midst of plagues, earthquakes and fires, the tower had
stood witness to the sorrows and the sufferings of humanity. It was no wonder
that it got converted into a fire look-out after yet another devastating
firestorm swept the city at the beginning of the 18th century. Now,
happy times were here, it seemed, going by the merry hordes of tourists whose
waiting lines could be seen snaking far into the streets below. To us, it was
an observation tower thatbrought into
view the shimmering waters of the Bosporus, the
seraglios and palaces of the Sultans, the slender minarets of exquisite mosques,
and the terra-cotta tiled rooftops harking back to the Mediterranean cities
that were once part of the Ottoman Empire.

The tower also found use as a prison during the reign of
Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-66). It was put to more productive use as
an observatory by the royal astronomer Takki-uddin Effendi towards the end of
the sixteenth century. The observatory was helpful in scheduling royal events
in accordance with favourable astrological conditions, as well as visual moon-sighting
for Islamic festivals without any fuss.

Fatih, Tugrul and Yusuf, who had not yet started their
flying training, brought up the subject of how much fun it would be to jump off
the tower in a hang glider. I was not sure if they were hinting at the legend
of their very own Turkish birdman, but I knew that every tower had a tale or
two about intrepid characters who had broken more than a limb trying out man’s
eternal dream to take to the skies.

Being a flier myself, I took delight in relating the story
of the ‘man with a thousand skills’, Hezarfen Ahmet Chelebi who had flown
across the Bosporus on eagle’s wings glued together,
turning him into a birdman. After nine
short trial runs, he fearlessly jumped from the tower as the Ottoman Sultan
Murad Khan was watching from his nearby mansion, sometime in 1632. Landing in
Uskadar after a three-kilometre ‘trans-continental’ flight without as much as a
scratch, he was feted with a sackful of gold coins by the Sultan. To his
discomfiture, Chelebi was soon to learn that he had been sent into exile by the
capricious Sultan for his ‘ability of doing anything he wishes’. Perhaps, the farsighted
Sultan was scared by the thought of Chelebi flying into his palace grounds, and
overthrowing him in a first-ever regime change through air power alone! The
story of Chelebi’s feat has great currency in Turkey,
I was told by the cadets. After all, Istanbul’s
third airport is named after Hezarfen for good reason.

If GalataTower
looks like the crowned head of Istanbul,
Taksim Square feels like
its throbbing heart.The artery
connecting the two is the famous Istiklal Avenue,
largely a pedestrian-only street, except for the historic tram that runs up and
down its one-and-a-half kilometre length. We decided to walk along the avenue
lined with trendy boutiques, cafés and pubs, cinemas and theatres, and many
churches, mosques and synagogues. Every once in a while a tram would slowly
rumble past, with a ringing bell warning pedestrians to keep clear.I had seen similar trams in Karachi
of the sixties, but sadly, none could be kept operational as traffic increased
enormously, while no one had the good sense to limit a few roads to pedestrians
and heritage trams.

We passed by the Church
of St Anthony, the largest Roman
Catholic church of Istanbul.That one of its preachers rose to be a Pope
(Pope XXIII, 1958-63) came as a surprise to me.He was fondly called the ‘Turkish Pope’ for his fluency in Turkish, though
his association with Turkey
came about only when he was Vatican’s
ambassador to the country.

It was pack-up time at the prestigious GalatasarayHigh School, and suddenly Istiklal
Avenue was swamped with children. Founded in 1453,
it is Turkey’s
oldest high school, and entrance is restricted to the best of the best; this
was evident by the well-groomed and disciplined students, even when out of
sight of their hard taskmasters.

Our walk terminated at Taksim
Square, the central point of the city, and the hub
of its transportation system. Taksim or ‘division’ is named after the water
distributory system of the late Ottoman era. Today, the square houses the
famous RepublicMonument
crafted by the Italian sculptor Pietro Canonica in 1928. It portrays Kemal Ataturk
and other founders of modern Turkey
in heroic poses. Statues, as most people might know, are not at all kosher in secular
Turkey.

The square was encircled with the Turkish flags called al-bairak (the red banner), giving the
whole area a festive air, even though it was no national day. Display of al-bairak is a national fad indulged in
with a passion by the Turks.During political
rallies, mass meetings of activists, and Republic Day celebrations, the square
is awash with national flags and banners of all kinds. There have been some violent protests in
recent times, but we were lucky to find a placid environment to relax after a
hectic day. The cleanliness of the area was as much a reflection of the
efficient municipality, as the discipline and fastidious nature of the Turkish
people at large.

The three cadets were very pleased that I had thoroughly
taken to the city in which their Academy was located. They were also excited to
have visited Chelebi’s launch pad that had him soaring, and they looked forward
to be up in the air one day, soon.I
assured them that it would be a good pretext for me to be in Istanbul
once again to watch them soar high. From Galata to Uskadar next time!